Sarandon would play a mysterious woman who has a tumultuous affair with a younger man who was in a prison camp during the Korean War, Variety reports. The woman and the art-house films she shows at her independent movie theater make her the target of communist suspicion in the Providence, R.I., community.

Rialto is based on a story by Christian Blackwood and director Borden. It's not to be confused with another in-development period film also sporting a popular movie theater name, Bijou, which may star Jim Carrey as an amnesiac, likewise in McCarthy-era America.